one
cause; their loyalty to their Sovereign had survived his abdication;
and though absent and a prisoner, the name of Ferdinand VII was the
rallying-point of the nation. But let the House look at the situation
in which England would be placed should she, at the present moment,
march her armies to the aid of Spain. As against France alone, her
task might not be more difficult than before; but is it only with
France that she would now have to contend? England could not strike in
the cause of Spain against the invading foe alone. Fighting in Spanish
ranks, should we not have to point our bayonets against Spanish
bosoms? But this is not the whole of the difference between the
present moment and the year 1808. In 1808 we had a large army prepared
for foreign service a whole war establishment ready appointed: and
the simple question was, in what quarter we could best apply its
force against the common enemy of England, of Spain, of Portugal,--of
Europe. This country had no hopes of peace: our abstinence from the
Spanish war could in no way have accelerated the return of that
blessing; and the Peninsula presented, plainly and obviously, the
theatre of exertion in which we could contend with most advantage.
Compare, then, I say, that period with the present; in which, none of
the inducements, or incitements, which I have described as belonging
to the opportunity of 1808, can be found.

But is the absence of inducement and incitement all? Is there no
positive discouragement in the recollections of that time, to check
too hasty a concurrence in the warlike views of the honourable member
for Westminster? When England, in 1808, under all the circumstances
which I have enumerated, did not hesitate to throw upon the banks of
the Tagus, and to plunge into all the difficulties of the Peninsular
War, an army destined to emerge in triumph through the Pyrenees, was
that course hailed with sympathy and exultation by all parties in the
State? Were there no warnings against danger? no chastisements for
extravagance? no doubts--no complaints--no charges of rashness and
impolicy? I have heard of persons, Sir,--persons of high authority
too--who, in the very midst of the general exaltation of spirit
throughout this country, declared that, 'in order to warrant England
in embarking in a military co-operation with Spain, something more was
necessary than to show that the Spanish cause was just.' 'It was not
enough,' said these enlightened monit